#thgoldenera

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Corse

Agfa Vista 200

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Circa 2015, one of the first car meets I ever attended. 

Canon T70 50mm F1.8 Kodak Portra 400

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Since Forever // Topp Drift p.1

I met Clive for the first time shortly after snapping the first picture you see in this post. You can tell he hadn’t been on track yet from the fact that he wasn’t yet wearing his Converse sneakers. He drives the same Toyota Corolla hatch he’s been driving for the past 10 years, about the same time as he’s been hanging with Merlin.

Neither of these cars are going to blow your socks off. The Corolla makes due with a first-gen 4A-GE with some head work, and the 240sx is working with an SR20DE. Collectively, these two couldn’t even pump out 300WHP on a good day, but if you think that matters you’re mistaken. I can’t shake the resemblance these two bear to Osaka’s Kanjo racers, from their mismatched wheels, to their mostly stock engines swapped in from more powerful sibling cars. These are two cars built with the sole aim of delivering driving thrills on a budget, through chassis balance. Over the long years that they’ve owned their cars each one has been through several iterations before arriving at their current state, each car carrying bespoke modifications fabricated by the two drivers. From Clive’s chassis bracing and lower control arms, to Merlin’s exhaust and front strut bar, these two have taken the built not bought philosophy further than most.

If you’re the type of person who thinks the 200hp isn’t enough, 1 ride in Clive’s 86 will show you 100hp is all you need.

Toyota Corolla Hatch (“AE86″ Canadian market, 4A-GE gen 1 swap) Nissan 240SX Hatch (“S13″ Canadian market, SR20DE swap)

Canon AE-1 Program 50mm F1.8 35mm film; variety unknown

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The Bare Necessities

Most of you would be inclined to describe this as a drift-missile, and while you wouldn’t be entirely wrong; I’m here to tell you why there’s more to it than that. Taking a quick glance at the exterior would show that it’s undoubtedly quite mangled, however look a little closer; plexi-glass windows (where they’ve been retained), aftermarket control-arms with ball-joints instead of rubber bushings, dual-callipers in the rear, gusset plates on the welded roll cage.

This isn’t just another missile.

The sticker by the steering wheel translates from roughly to “light weight is easy to maneuver”

Looking at the interior it’s obvious there’s more care than a run of the mill missile. Yes, it’s absolutely gutted to the greatest extent possible, however there’s a custom fabricated aluminum dash and switch panel alongside the aforementioned welded roll cage. However what really sets this car apart from most 240s is what sits under the hood.

It’s a stock KA24DE.

Alright, not STOCK stock, it’s got an aftermarket intake as well as a custom (VERY loud and VERY obnoxious) open header exhaust, but if we’re being honest with ourselves it’s probably still making less power than it did as stock in 1992. Inspite of the drivetrain, I love this car.... no i take that back, I love this car BECAUSE of the drivetrain. With even pretty standard SR swaps going for as much as $5,000 in my area, that’s no joke. The fact that the owner chose to spend that money on completely updating his suspension rather than JDM engine clout makes it infinitely more special than any other 240 I saw that day. He built something more inline with a miata or an 86 than anything I’ve seen come out of the s-chassis community. There’s a focus on weight reduction and it’s placement in the vehicle, suspension tuning and chassis development being coupled with a linear and responsive (albeit low powered) naturally aspirated engine as opposed to bigger turbos and more boost.

Heart-warming? yes

More than just a missile? Absolutely

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Dear Porsche, I Love You.

991 Gen 2 Porsche 911 GT3

Many years ago when I was a less knowledgeable, albeit no less passionate car enthusiast, when long division and swimming lessons were my biggest worries I used to ridicule Porsche 911s. I would say “Only dentists and people in their midlife crisis buy those cars, not real car enthusiasts.” At the time I was a fan of early 70s Detroit muscle and more of a Vin Diesel guy than a Paul Walker one.

Someone aught to have washed out my mouth with soap.

However as I grew older I spent ever increasing hours on the internet, reading every scrap of information I could get my hands on. My tastes evolved, I learned that you can’t beat physics, not even with all the horsepower in the world. Lightweight is king and big power means nothing without an equally capable chassis.

This Example is Owned By a Friend and Equipped With a PDK Transmission

I rediscovered Porsche and noticed that there was something happening in the rest of the world that wasn’t happening in Stuttgart. While every other manufacturer was losing focus, cutting costs and diluting what made them great in the first place, Porsche was embracing it.

While Ferrari stopped offering any of their vehicles with a manual transmission, a stick was still the sole option available on Porsche’s GT3 and GT3RS variants. When BMW unveiled their new BMW M3 in 2015 they ended their line of iconic high-revving naturally aspirated powerplants in favour of a twin-turbocharged unit, and although Porsche went down the same path in 2016 with their facelift, they doubled down on their GT range cars carrying over even more parts from their Lemans winning Porsche 911 RSR race car, as well as re-introducing a manual gearbox option for the GT3.

What excites me the most about Porsche is their bleeding edge chassis development. It is with the aforementioned mid-cycle refresh that the engineers managed to better the GT3RS’ laptime around the Nordschleife by TWENTY-FOUR SECONDS. This was accomplished primarily through increases in cornering and braking performance according to the man who set the new laptime, as the engine only received a 20HP bump. The increases in cornering performance and braking are largely a result of the switch to Michelin’s new Cup 2 R tires, increases in aero performance, weight reduction, and my personal favourite, an abundance of suspension tuning including replacing all the rubber in the suspension links with ball-joints.

Where else can you find a stock streetcar with a suspension system devoid of rubber? What more is there to say?

Porsche, I Love you.

Yours Truly, Abtin

Porsche 911 GT3 (991.2)

Yashica FX-3 Super 2000

28mm F2.8

Agfa Vista 200

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Slip Club.

Toyota Corolla “AE86″ Coupe

Honda F20C Swap, Individual throttle bodies, FD Competition Spec

Built by Cyrious Garage

Shot on iPhone X

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Blog Update

First and foremost I want to acknowledge the fact that I’ve been seriously lagging with posting new content lately, however I’ve got good news pertaining to the blog.

Today I dropped of 43 rolls of film to be developed and scanned. This is over 4 years of backlog that I’ve finally got around to developing, and includes 3 rounds of Topp Drift, one round of Drift Jam, Cars and Coffee, local car meets, and possibly more. All of the colour film will be back in my possession by Monday, and the black & white will be ready by Thursday.

The picture that’s above this post was taken at the final round of Drift Jam that took place this past Sunday, it’s the a teaser of what’s store when I come around to dropping the full story. However before I post that you can expect to see the full album of pictures that goes along with the JZX100 you’ve seen by now, which was at the previous round of Drift Jam.

I’m super excited to comb through all these pictures and share them with all of you. 

Mazda Miata/MX-5 (NA6) Mazda RX-7 (FD)

iPhone X

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N O   F U N

BMW 330i (E46)

Canon AE-1 Program 50mm F1.8 Film Unknown